The 6 Enemies of Food Storage

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Stocking up on food gets expensive, and every frugal bone in my body shudders at the thought of anything going to waste. I try to store everything in the best possible conditions and watch out for these six enemies. Depending on your storage conditions all, some, or none of these may be a concern.

Watch out for these 6 enemies of food storage

1. Heat

The longest possible shelf life is attained when food is stored somewhere between 40 degrees and 72 degrees. For every 18 degrees above 72, food will lose its’ nutritional value by half, and over time, it will lose much of its’ original flavor, texture, and appearance. If you can keep your food consistently cool, you’re in great shape.

It’s important to keep food as dry as possible. An air-conditioner or a dehumidifer can help as well as making sure the food is packaged with as little moisture as possible. Store food off the floor and away from outside walls where moisture might seep in.

Over time, oxygen changes the appearance, flavor, and texture of food. When fats oxidize they become rancid. Use oxygen absorbers, rotate food to reduce the chances of oxidation, and pay attention to the other five enemies of food storage. Working to eliminate oxygen will also kill any bacteria, and vacuum packing food can help with this.

Many dry foods can be popped in the freezer for at least four days to ensure that microscopic insect eggs will never hatch. Keep food in air-tight containers. Make sure there aren’t any food particles on the shelves or floor, and keep all food storage areas very clean. If mice are a problem, well, you know what you’ve gotta do.

If possible, keep your pantry area dark. Light can and will affect the flavor and appearance of food, but it’s also the easiest enemy to keep at bay. If you have food stored in clear containers, keep them in labeled boxes with lids. It won’t be as attractive as all those pretty jars filled with homemade preserves and canned veggies, but they’ll last longer.

6. Kids

So far, I’ve lost entire boxes of granola bars, energy bars, and two or three cases of Capri-Suns have mysteriously emptied. Perhaps a kid-proof lock on the pantry door can take care of this particular hazard.

Food storage is an investment and should be treated as one. Since an insurance policy like you get for your house or car isn’t possible, taking the extra steps to keep it safe from these six enemies is well worth your time.

This article has been updated from the original version published on August 8, 2011.

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Comments

You forgot that along with kids …. there are husbands. I keep losing the cans of nuts, mysteriously. All I know is that they tended to disappear on Friday nights as my husband would watch Battlestar Galactica.

That reminds me of the time my husband came with me to a business conference. He stayed in the hotel room and watched TV while I went to my workshops. Every day I noticed the mini bar getting more and more empty until we owed something like $200!!!

Somewhat OT, but probably amusing to you: My husband got season 1 of Battlestar Galactica for Christmas. We finally started watching it last month and he really liked it, so I got the whole series on BluRay and hid it for Father's Day. I told him I had it so he wouldn't go buy it for himself. For the first time in the nearly 15 yrs I've known him, he went and searched out and took his present early! I guess BSG brings out the pilferer in husbands. :-p

Well, that's what it's for. LOL My family regularly "rotates" stuff for me. I try to tell them to at least tell me they've eaten it, so I can replace it, but you know boys. I've learned to know what they'll most likely "disappear", and just check and replace those things on my own. Now and then I get thrown for a loop. Caught youngest son eating a can of gumbo soup he'd dug out of the deep storage. Mikey, eating something with vegetables? He may be under hypnosis!

I'm with Barbara – it's just part of the rotating system. As long as they tell me what part they're "rotating" out for me, it's all good. Well, as long as we're talking grocery store food, not the much more expensive Mountain House, which I have A LOT less of anyhow.

Maybe storing them in the linen closet, behind or under towels? I know my husband has averaged going into the linen closet less than once a year in all our years together. 🙂 Or in with the Christmas or other holiday decorations.

that makes me think of a piece of fiction I have read, which the main characters have a somewhat prepper attitude. The setup that this story describes to counter that, is effectively an old computer ( this house was already wired for UPS regardless), a barcode scanner, and some basic inventory management software. If you take something , you scan it out, if you don't it will *not* be replaced ( after all, it isn't officially out of stock, and the computer prints the shopping list for resupply. after a couple of times of their favourite things running out without restock, most kids get the hint)
not viable if you can't afford to have a computer running all the time, but there is nothing saying that it has to be a sole use dedicated boxen ( it helps, mind, but it isn't a core requirement), or else maybe something modified for rapid start up, and linked in to the pantry door, as to make it only on when needed
Then again, I'm thinking like an EE

I have the opposite problem re: ravioli. My kids loved canned ravioli for years, and now when I occasionally open a can, they sort of pick at it and may or may not eat it all. I don't particularly like serving it, but it's a handy food for long-term storage. Wouldn't you know, I have about 40 cans of it.

All foods get dated with black marker when I bring them home from the grocery store (things that have expiration date get that date, things that don't get date of purchase) before they get put away this makes it easy when I am rotating stock or pulling stuff off the shelf. I only shop when the hubby or kids are home to help. There is a shopping list on the refrigerator at all times and if you use something you have to write it on the shopping list. My kids (girls) don't get into the supplies I have stored. I'm not sure if they are too lazy to look or fear the wrath of Mom. I don't care if my husband gets into things because he is the best about putting things on the list. As far as rotating my stock I go through at least every 6 mos and pull out anything that has a date 9-12 months out I put those in the cupboard to be used and replace. I do wish I had a cool (temperature) place to store things though.

I just put a bunch of food into 5 gallon buckets. I have one entire 5 gallon bucket dedicated to vacuum sealed chocolate. And it doesn't all fit in! 😮 Priorities are important. We have cows near us (and by near, I mean no more than 1/4 mile), so we should be able to get some milk, but I'm pretty sure we don't have a single solitary cocoa bean farm here in VA, so we're stocking up!

A "#7"?? Time and Oil. Foods with oil content will go rancid with time. Wheat is fine "as built", but after grinding, it will deteriorate due to the oils within. Brown rice will not last as long as white, etc… Consider the food, and when in doubt, check it out against a known source of information.

With regard to brown rice, can someone please provide information that supports the idea that brown rice doesn't last very long? I have looked all over and found statements like that, but nothing scientific or empirical. We eat short grain brown rice almost exclusively and the last 20# bag lasted us almost a year. It was fresh and good from the word "go" until tonight when I finished the last of it. We live in Michigan, so there's definitely humidity, and I did nothing special to keep the rice.

My other thought about storing brown rice is that if I store it like my beans and other things (mylar bags with O2 absorbers), and then (most importantly) cook what I store and store what I cook, is there a problem? Or am I missing a piece of the puzzle?

We've used stored brown rice as late as a year, also, and it cooks differently. It was stored on a shelf. Other brown that came out of a seal mylar bag was better. The white was unchanged. I expect 7 years at least from the white, and about 2 years max from the brown, based on the changes. A pal of mine, who'se been at this for 35 years or so says the brown will continue to deteriorate – some fast than others. The trick to extending its life is the removal of oxygen, as with just about all foods.

Usually, once a can of dehydrated or freeze dried food is opened, it has a shelf life of six months to a year. Of course, that will depend on whether or not it's in a hot or humid environment and kept safe from insects and rodents. There's no need to refrigerate the opened can. Most likely, considering the shelf life once it's open, you're pretty safe to go ahead and just keep it in the pantry. Now, if you hate the food once you try it, that's another matter. You might want to track down smaller cans to try first, before a disaster hits. Some people are just fine with taco flavored TVP, for example, others can't stand it. That's something you really should know ahead of time. All-in-One Preparedness sells smaller cans of many dehydrated foods.

I really want to prepare for our uncertain future by storing food for emergencies. However, I am not sure where the best place for my pantry would be. We have a basement but it also houses our water cistern. Anything metallic stored in the basement rusts very quickly. I suppose that means that its probably very humid. How do you go about determining whether ones basement is humid or not. If I used a dehumidifier what if we lose electricity which happens periodically out here in the country?

I keep a cilp board on each set of shelves,inventory the whole lot and INSIST that whom ever takes some thing off the shelf marks it off the list…..It may take a while to train the family….mine learned the hard way that you mess up mom's list….it's PB&J and water till it gets straighted out

I have a question about Enemy #1 – Heat. Does this apply to even the vacuum sealed, with oxygen absorbers, in Mylar bags, In gamma sealed buckets stored food??? It's hard to have a "root cellar" here in Hawaii!

Re boys, husbands & rotation – I always place the "Newer" stuff in the back, while moving the "Older" stuff to the front, then I give those who eat the "Older" stuff. Since it's easier for those who reach in to grab the "Older" stuff, it's rotated out and replaced by the "Newer" stuff… It takes more time, but it trains others to eat & drink the "older" stuff as it's replaced by "newer" stuff.

I’m new to prepping and survival basics and I have a question. We live in Arizona the land of extreme’s weather wise. If we were to say, lose electricity and we don’t have a generator to keep our house at optimal temperatures for storing dry goods. What’s the best thing I can do to keep my food from spoiling in the extreme temperatures or my bottles of water exploding from the heat? I’ve tried to keep a bugout bag in my car but everything melts or explodes from the extreme temperatures. What can I do? What if I can’t go home in an emergency? Please help! Thanks!

Bozy, I’m in Arizona, too, and know all about extreme weather! You probably don’t have to worry about water bottles exploding. I keep a few cases in our garage to grab whenever we hit the road and have never had a problem. If you’re thinking they might freeze, add a couple of inches of head room at the top before capping. Regarding food in the bugout bag, you need to keep that food in a separate small bag you keep stored right next to your purse or backpack. OR store food like granola bars, hard candies, high calorie energy bars — foods that won’t melt and are usually okay in high temperatures.

If the power goes out and you’re concerned about your food, just do the best you can. Keep it in the coolest part of the house, under beds, in closets. And by the way, a generator won’t be of much help in a long-term power-down scenario anyway.

For the kid problem, I go against all common advice and stock some foods that we don’t normally eat but would in an emergency. They still have a tendency to eat the favorites too quickly, but by storing foods that they’ve outgrown or are tired of, I know that we’ll always have spare food. I also use canning jars to divide things like drink mixes and snacks, and I make sure that they’re not all stored together. If someone gets into a single jar, it’s no big deal, because they’re not likely to sort through all the jars in all the cupboards to wipe out the entire supply. The kids are older now, but we’ve been using this method with success for most of their lives.

For Sue regarding brown rice going bad faster than white: Brown rice still has the hull on, which contains more of the oils. Oils go bad faster than non oil products, so it WILL go bad faster than white rice.

I have a question regarding what type of rice to buy. I usually get long grain, but I’ve been reading lately that some rice sold has arsenic in it. So, how does one buy the product without fear of being poisoned?

I do a lot of canning and have a son who helps in that department, too. However, we do not can meat so I have been buying canned meat. We have a small stock of canned meats, now, but with prices going through the roof in the grocery stores, I won’t be purchasing much more! I’m also keeping in mind the expiration dates on these cans. We stock up our freezers, too, but if an EMP occurs, without a generator would permit those frozen foods to thaw and go to waste. Water is also a main concern. My son bought a water purifier that wasn’t cheap and it is suppose to purify even some chemically charged waters, tho not all. I’m so glad to have been referred to this site. Looking forward to more tips on how to plan ahead to be prepared just in case!

Living on Vancouver Island, I thought that humidity was my biggest enemy of food storage. Then one day I rowed across the bay to where my sons would go camping and found 19 empty #10 cans of freeze-dried strawberries stored neatly by their campfire pit. (we live in a wilderness area) When I asked my sons about it they said they were just testing our food storage. Teenage boys really are helpful!

What suggestions would you have for storage in a desert climate? I live in the Mojave and summer temps can reach 118°. The only place I have to keep things is my garage, and even though it’s a finished garage it easily hits 100° in there for weeks on end.

Scroll down to pages 8 and 9 for more information about heat and food storage. By the way, I used to live in Phoenix and am very well acquainted with summer heat! We set aside a room in our house for food storage.

Trackbacks

[…] has long set the standard when it comes to the shelf life of its foods. Oxygen is one of the 5 enemies of food storage, and Mountain House manages to remove 98% of it from their pouches. Recently, an independent lab […]

[…] Store millet in a tightly closed container and in a cool, dark, dry location. If you’re planning on storing millet long-term, it would be wise to put the containers of millet in the freezer for at least a week. This will kill off any microscopic insect eggs that might hatch later on. To be on the extra safe side, add an oxygen absorber to the millet once its time in the freezer ends. The oxygen absorber will deprive any remaining, live insect eggs of oxygen, thus killing them. Oxygen absorbers are inexpensive and easy to use. They will also remove oxygen in the container, which leads to a longer shelf life. […]

[…] Store millet in a tightly closed container and in a cool, dark, dry location. If you’re planning on storing millet long-term, it would be wise to put the containers of millet in the freezer for at least a week. This will kill off any microscopic insect eggs that might hatch later on. To be on the extra safe side, add an oxygen absorber to the millet once its time in the freezer ends. The oxygen absorber will deprive any remaining, live insect eggs of oxygen, thus killing them. Oxygen absorbers are inexpensive and easy to use. They will also remove oxygen in the container, which leads to a longer shelf life. […]